


Somewhere in the Middle

by SassyEverlarking



Category: Hunger Games Series - All Media Types, Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-20
Updated: 2014-03-20
Packaged: 2018-01-16 09:34:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,459
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1342600
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SassyEverlarking/pseuds/SassyEverlarking
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>With him, she’d always known she’d be starting in the middle. Living with the reality of it was a little more difficult than she’d expected. Written for Prompts in Panem Round 5, Day 4.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Somewhere in the Middle

It was the smell of something cooking, a scent that was ten different sorts of wonderful, that woke Katniss from her nap on the couch. She inhaled deeply, taking it all in. As she let out a dreamy sigh, her grey eyes fluttered open to see the sky outside was starting to turn a deep orange with the setting sun.

She’d slept longer than she’d planned. Or rather,  _he_  had let her sleep longer than she had planned. Pushing herself into a sitting position, Katniss glanced over her left shoulder towards the kitchen. Peeta stood with his back to her, busy at the counter quietly chopping at something. His head was bobbing up and down in a continuous rhythm and Katniss eyed the cord from his earbuds traveling down his back.

She wanted to be annoyed with him for letting her sleep. But the way his broad shoulders flexed as he chopped, and with the heavenly scent of whatever he was cooking filling their apartment, she found she couldn’t really muster the feeling. Katniss maneuvered around so her feet were resting on the floor and eased herself up slowly. Stretching her arms high over her head, she sighed when she felt her back pop in a few places.

She meandered her way towards the kitchen, scratching at her stomach under the shirt she’d unapologetically taken from Peeta. She didn’t bother to stop in the doorway to take in the scene before her. She’d been with this man long enough to be used to the messes he made when he worked in the kitchen.

Stepping up behind Peeta, Katniss took a moment to appreciate how his ass filled out his jeans just right. God, she couldn’t wait to have the whole weekend to herself with this man. Her appetite lately had been so insatiable, and it hadn’t been just a craving for food. She reached her hands out, place them on his hips and squeezing gently. He tensed under her touch momentarily and then relaxed as she pressed herself against his back, her arms wrapping around his middle.

She pressed a kiss against his t-shirt, right between his shoulders, waiting until he had pulled one of his headphones out before speaking.

“You’re a sneak.” She mumbled playfully, her voice raspy from sleep. She turned her head and rested her cheek against him. He was always so pleasantly warm.

Peeta laughed lightly at the accusation. “Oh yeah?” His tone made it clear he knew exactly why she’d said it.

“We were supposed to make dinner together.” Katniss tried to add a flare of petulance to her voice, but the yawn that came on suddenly defeated the attempt.

“But you looked so cute sleeping on the couch, with the afternoon sun falling across you.” Peeta shrugged. She heard him set down his chopping knife and then found herself wrapped up in his arms as he turned to face her. He was smiling softly. “I would’ve sketched it if I wasn’t sure you’d have absolutely yelled at me for it.”

Katniss frowned. “I wouldn’t have-” She stopped at Peeta’s raised eyebrow. “Okay, I probably would have.”

Nodding, Peeta leaned his head down. “Oh, you definitely would have.” He pressed his lips to hers tenderly. She moved her arms up over his chest, wrapping her hands around the back of his neck to draw him in closer. Katniss opened her mouth to his, deepening the kiss. Peeta moaned, trailing his hands down her back and stopping them at her ass. He squeezed gently, eliciting a moan of her own, before he started to walk her backwards. She went without question and didn’t hesitate to pull herself up when he hoisted her up onto the counter by the sink.

Peeta pressed himself between her legs, hands firmly planted on her thighs. He pulled his mouth away from hers with a soft pop, resting his forehead against hers. The smile he gave her made her smile in return. Katniss played with his golden curls hanging down past his left ear.

“So what’s for dinner?” She couldn’t keep the excitement out of her voice.

Snorting, Peeta pulled back and looked away. He grinned and shook his head. “Always about the food with you.” He laughed and brought his bright blue eyes back to meet hers.

Katniss shrugged and grinned. “I’m a growing girl…”

Peeta made a face that she could only describe to mean ‘don’t I know it!’

“Peeta…” She whined, tugging on a curl and tapping her ankle against the back of his leg.

He smiled again and brought his hand up to brush at her hair. Katniss was sure it looked a mess after her nap. She could feel her braid had started to come undone. “It’s lamb stew.”

If her mouth hadn’t been watering before, Katniss was sure she was practically drooling at his revelation. “Peeta, you really are such a sneak.” She laughed, knowing she was feeling far more ecstatic over the meal than she should. She grabbed his face, pulling herself up to kiss him fully once more. God, she really  _was_  going to devour him after devouring dinner. Her all time favorite meal…

Realization hit Katniss in an instant. She felt Peeta tense slightly as she let up on the kiss when it did and it made her pull away. She stared up at him suspiciously. “Why are are making me lamb stew?” Her hands were still holding his head firmly in place.

Peeta swallowed hard, but then tried to effect a casual look. “Because I love you?”

“Peeta…” Katniss warned.

He closed his eyes, letting out a reluctant sigh. “Glimmer called while you were asleep.” He said in a quiet, defeated tone.

Katniss deflated significantly, her hands dropping from Peeta’s face onto the counter. “Why did she do that?” She couldn’t help herself from asking, even when she knew what the answer was.

“You know exactly why, Katniss.” Peeta sighed, calling her on the pointless question. He stepped away from her to the refrigerator to distract himself from having to look at her.

“Tell me you didn’t say yes.” Katniss pleaded, bouncing a little in her spot.

Peeta frowned, still staring into the fridge. It was obvious he wasn’t looking for anything in particular. “Of course I said yes. What else what I was supposed to say?”

“You were supposed to say no, Peeta!”

“Katniss…” Peeta’s tone was disapproving, as was the look her tossed her way. He slammed the fridge door closed and moved back to the counter opposite of where she sat. He resumed his chopping, though he was no longer trying to be quiet about it.

“This was supposed to be our weekend, Peeta.” Katniss felt the tears coming and she hated that she couldn’t stop them. “You and me. Together. Alone.”

Peeta slammed knife down in frustration and turned back to her. “What do you want me to do, Katniss?” His voice was loud, but not quite at yelling. “I’m not exactly happy about giving up our weekend - again. I’m not happy that Glimmer keeps doing this. I’m not doing this just to piss you off.”

Dropping her gaze to her lap cause the built up tears to fall down her cheeks. “It’s not fair…” She whispered. Peeta’s shadow fell over her as he moved to stand in front of her again.

“Please don’t cry.” Peeta sighed, wrapping her in a hug and rubbing her back gently. “Please.”

Katniss pressed her face against his chest, breathing in shakily. She knew she was being unfair. But damn had she been looking forward to their weekend. She let out out a calming breath and pulled back. Peeta was watching her closely, worriedly.

He ran his thumb against her cheeks. “It’s my daughter, Katniss.” He whispered. “Willow has to come first.”

“I know.” She whispered back.

Peeta’s face was vulnerable and unsure. “I don’t wanna be the bad guy.”

Closing her eyes, Katniss shook her head. “You’re not.” She sighed. Opening them back up, she gave him a sympathetic look. “You’re the too good guy.”

Peeta nodded in agreement. “I know.” He mumbled before pressing his lips to her forehead in an apologetic kiss. Katniss let him stay that way for a few moments, selfishly wishing that her boyfriend  _didn’t_ have a heart of gold  _all_  the time.

When Peeta pulled back, she steeled her shoulders. “When are they getting here?”

“Around nine.”

She shrugged. “Guess I better go take my shower now then.”

Peeta nodded again, stepping back and grabbing her by the hips to help ease her back to the floor. Katniss smiled weakly at him and started to make her way out of the kitchen. Peeta grabbing her hand had her turning back.

“I love you.” He looked like a scolded puppy hoping to make things right again.

Katniss gave him a slightly stronger smile this time. “I love you too.”

“I’ll make it up to you, Katniss. I promise.” Peeta stated with conviction, squeezing her hand.

She shrugged her shoulders. “You don’t have anything to make up, Peeta.” She wished she could put a more positive emotion into her face, but all she could really do in that moment was reluctantly neutral. “Comes with the territory, right?”

Peeta’s own nod in return was just as reluctant. They both knew it was a half-assed, placating answer. Still, he brought her hand up to his lips and pressed a gentle kiss to the back of it. With that, Katniss pulled her hand from his and made her way towards their bedroom, feeling Peeta’s eyes on her until she passed into the hallway.

Once she was sure she was out of sight, she pressed her back against the hallway wall and squeezed her eyes closed tightly. The tears were threatening the come on strong again. She placed her hands down over her belly, feeling the gentle bump that had recently started to form.

If Willow Mellark was to always come first, Katniss couldn’t help but wonder what place the child she was now carrying fell into in Peeta’s life. Or herself for that matter.

——

It wasn’t very often that Katniss wished she could slap the crap out of Glimmer Fellows and teach her a lesson in common decency. Sure, she didn’t necessarily liked the woman. Never had really, even before either of them found themselves involved with Peeta Mellark. Glimmer was a bit too self-absorbed and materialistic for Katniss’ tastes. But she was the mother of Peeta’s kid, so Katniss tried to give her a little leeway most of the time.

‘Leeway’ in that current moment, however, was the farthest thing from Katniss’ mind. Instead, she was silently thinking off all the ways she would have thrown Glimmer to the ground and given her a piece of her mind…or maybe her fists.  _Would have_  because Glimmer hadn’t been brave enough to come upstairs to drop Willow off. Instead, she had asked Peeta to come down in that sickly sweet voice of her that always had Peeta dropping everything to do as she pleased.

He’d come back upstairs with an over hyper seven year old. Willow had immediately rushed to Katniss, who’d stayed upstairs to finish putting away the remnants of the stew, and thrown skinny arms tightly around her waist.

“Mommy let me have cake and cookies and ice cream for dinner!” The little girl had giggled excitedly.

It was now quarter to midnight, and there was still no sign of Willow’s sugarhigh dissipating. She had been bouncing around the apartment like a manic little pixie, carelessly disregarding much of what either Katniss or Peeta had told her. She was too jittery to play a board game, too bouncy to want to try and play with the X-Box. All she had wanted to do was run around and pretend she was some elven maiden protecting her kingdom from evil-doers.

It would’ve been adorable, if it hadn’t been going on for hours almost non-stop, at such high pitched volumes.

“Lillo, you need to put the pillow and paper towel roll down and get in the tub.” Peeta sigh, running his hand through his already disheveled hair. They had been tag-teaming with her all night and it was his turn to try and keep her from doing anything too adventurous. Like climb the entertainment center and ‘rescue’ his Lord of the Rings action figures from the top of it.

Willow bounced on the couch in his direction. “It’s not a pillow, daddy! It’s my shield!”  She held it up for emphasis, and then thrust out the cardboard roll in her hand. “And this is my dagger! I gotta protect the kingdom!”

“You’ve protected the kingdom enough tonight.” Peeta answered, moving towards her. “Now it’s bath, and then quiet time before bed.”

“No!” Willow shrieked, jumping off the couch and sprinting down the hallway to her bedroom. Peeta called after her as he followed.

Katniss rubbed at her temples and slouched down further in the chair by the couch. She could hear the ruckus from down the hall as a too-sweet father tried to reason with his hyperactive daughter.

She had known this was exactly how the night would go when Peeta had told her about Glimmer’s call. Of course, Willow showing up hopped up on sugar wasn’t what she had imagined precisely. Though she should’ve expected just as much. Glimmer wasn’t much of a grownup herself and had never taken to the whole “mother’  thing too well. She was much better at being Willow’s friend, she had said to Katniss once. Not all too surprising a response from someone who had gotten pregnant at sixteen.

Katniss sighed, remembering when she’d first heard about Peeta getting Glimmer pregnant unexpectedly. Even someone as social disconnect as her had heard it quickly enough. She didn’t believe it at first. Mr. Hometown Perfection, well on his way to being their class valedictorian, had knocked up the resident party girl? Certainly just a stupid rumor. Katniss hadn’t really known Peeta well enough back then, but they’d held a casual friendship since kindergarden. He was always volunteering to be her lab partner each semester. He was smart and just wouldn’t do something so cavalier.

She’d learn first hand, after they’d finally ended up dating a few years later, that Peeta did some dumb shit when he was drunk.

Still, Katniss remembered how he’d taken to fatherhood like it wasn’t some sort of burden placed on him. He was there for Glimmer through the entire pregnancy, and even offered the ‘gentlemanly’ course of action once Willow had been born. Glimmer, of course, had turned him down. She ‘wasn’t ready to settle down yet’, she’d said. Katniss wasn’t sure Glimmer would ever be ready to settle down and accept that she’d have to be a responsible parent sometime in her life. No - the responsible parent thing had always fallen to Peeta. It would always be daddy to the rescue when mommy felt like the kid was too much to handle.

The sound of the tub running broke Katniss out of her reminiscing. She quickly realized how quiet it was otherwise. She wasn’t sure how long she’d been lost in her thoughts, but from the sounds of it, Peeta had finally tamed the wild elven lass. Pushing herself out of the chair, she meandered down the hall, stopping in the doorway to the spare bathroom.

Willow was already seated in the tub, looking much more subdued as Peeta poured water over her long blond hair. Katniss stepped into the room, kneeling down by beside him.

“She crashed as soon as I got her to sit for a moment.” Peeta whispered, setting the cup down and reaching for the bottle of baby shampoo. Glimmer was always insistent about the stuff, even though Willow hadn’t been a baby for several years. “She’ll probably pass out as soon as we’re done here.”

Katniss nodded, watching Willow yawn widely. “I’ll go get her bed ready…”

She moved to stand, but Willow turned her head and looked sleepily between them. “Daddy, can Katniss wash my hair?”

Lowering herself back down to the floor, Katniss held out her hand so Peeta could fill it with shampoo. As she settled in, working the soap into a lather on Willow’s head, Peeta replaced the bottle. He pressed a kiss to Katniss temple before he stood, leaving them to it.

——

Getting  Willow’s bed all ready had been a useless endeavor. While Katniss had been busy helping her into her pj’s following her bath, Willow had asked in a sleepy mumble if she could sleep with them. Despite the havoc she’d been wreaking around the apartment all night, Katniss couldn’t find it in herself to deny the sleepy, blue-eyed gaze that had watching her pleadingly.

So Katniss currently found herself curled up in the bed that her and Peeta shared, Willow snuggled against her side. As Peeta had said, the little girl had conked right out the moment she’d settled under the covers.

“Not so horrible now, is it?” Peeta smiled smugly as he approached them from the bathroom. He looked from Katniss to her hand stroking through Willow’s damp curls and back.

Katniss rolled her eyes while he pulled up the covers and climbed into bed. “I never thought it was horrible.” He scooted close to them and she looked at him pointedly, her head propped up in her other hand. “Loud and exhausting, but not horrible. I’d never think your daughter was horrible.”

Pressing a kiss to her lips softly, Peeta shrugged and smile wryly. “Hard to tell sometimes.” He turned his gaze down to Willow.

“That’s not fair, Peeta.” Katniss sighed. They’d avoided talking about the issue since earlier in the kitchen, but it seemed he was ready to hash it out again. Of course with Willow laying between them, it couldn’t get heated. It wasn’t the first time Peeta had used the maneuver.

“I know you resent them.” Peeta offered, sounding like it was a indisputable fact.

Katniss closed her eyes. “Peeta…”

“Why were you crying in the shower?” He asked her softly. Her eyes snapped open and she found he was looking to her again, brow furrowed. “I wanted to ask you something about dinner and I walked in and heard you crying.”

Turning her head, Katniss felt tears prick at her vision. She let out a shaky breath, hating how easy it was for her emotions to take over. All night she’d been flip flopping. Lust to bitterness to anger to semi-contentment. Her heart had almost bust in two when Willow had pressed her nose into her side and fallen asleep. She felt guilt spring up over how she’d been criticizing the situation all night, and she felt guilt now over Peeta’s question.

“Katniss…” His hand pressed against the back of her head, stroking comfortingly.

Opening her grey eyes, she looked back to him. The tears came slowly. “I just…” She glanced down to Willow. “She’s your world. I know that. She always will be.”

The bed dipped as Peeta shifted closer, his arm dropping around her shoulders. “You’re my world too.” He whispered to her.

“I feel second best, sometimes.” Katniss confessed, hating it even as she said it. “That every part of me I give to you will always be second best.” She blinked rapidly, more tears falling. “And that’s so selfish of me. You don’t deserve it.”

Peeta pressed another kiss to her lips, bringing his hand back to her head to pull her in closed. Katniss poured her emotions into it, trying to convey as many ‘sorries’ as she could into it. It lasted only a few long seconds before Peeta broke his lips away, resting his forehead against hers.

His gaze was steady and fierce. “You…” He shook his head and reached out over Willow to place his hand on Katniss’ belly. “All of you…” He swallowed and smiled. “All of us? That’s what’s important to me.” He sat back, looking away towards the curtain-covered window. “I know I give in to Glimmer too much. I know I… I take a lot from you and give it elsewhere.”

He turned his attention back to Katniss. “There’s no how-to on how to make these situations work, ya know?”

Katniss snorted, wiping away her tears. “No shit.”

“I love Lillo,” Peeta looked briefly to his daughter. “And I love you. And I love our baby growing inside you.” He smiled and moved his blues eyes back up to take her in. “I’m sorry about tonight. And this weekend. I’m sorry Willow’s mother isn’t the best. I really… I just want this all to work out.”

Nodding, Katniss reached out and took Peeta’s hand. She squeezed it firmly.

“Me too.”


End file.
